


Ashes of us

by skytramp



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M, Post-Time War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-31
Updated: 2015-07-31
Packaged: 2018-04-12 06:47:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4469357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skytramp/pseuds/skytramp
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They have a mission, find the Doctor and Donna and tell them what they need to hear, but it's a lot harder to maneuver a time vortex than they thought, even with Rose's experience, and she finds a Doctor she wasn't quite expecting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ashes of us

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Muccamukk](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Muccamukk/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Shattered Into Ash](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1126710) by [Muccamukk](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Muccamukk/pseuds/Muccamukk). 



> This is a fic for the FemmeRemix Challenge; I was more of a pinch hitter than anything due to not having written enough fandoms that other people do so this is my first Doctor Who fic! Please forgive the loose interpretation of the original :) I hope you enjoy it!

The whir of the TARDIS was all around her and a big part of Rose felt at home. It didn’t matter that she had a mission, that she had to find the Doctor and set everything right, the sounds and movements were so familiar they felt like breathing. 

“Rose--Rose, hun, wake up.” She was being shaken awake by her father’s hand on her shoulder and the reality hit her like a punch in the stomach-- it wasn’t the TARDIS, all she had was a ramshackle time jump mechanism cobbled together from pieces of cyber-man tech that the government missed and a few of her own inventions here or there. Who would have thought that Rose Tyler, twenty years old, a former shop girl and all around fuckup, would be the type to change the world, and more than once. 

“We’ve got it calibrated now,” her father continued as she wiped the sleep from her eyes. She’d fallen asleep at the shop again, in the midst of calibrations. Dad was a saint for doing it all by himself. 

“What’s that? Do we have another target or just same old?” There were places they tried, moments that felt poignant, where time dragged like heavy furniture over carpet, that were easier for her to reach. They’d tried them all at least a dozen times with no luck, but finding new points was proving difficult. 

“It’s new, it came in while you were sleeping, come and take a look at this.” He waved her over, gesturing to the display monitor in front of him. Sure enough, she saw when she reached it, it was a new point, but it was hard to tell much other than that. It could be anywhere, truly, or anywhen. 

“We ready then?” She asked, and he nodded gravely. “It’ll be fine, dad, we’ve done this plenty.”

“You’ve done this plenty, Rose, and I swear if it wasn’t about saving the world I’d never let you near the time vortex again.” 

“ _We’ve_ done this,” She asserted, and rested a hand on his arm, “alright? You’re more help than you know.” 

He nodded in reply and she clapped her hand against his arm before letting go. 

“Let’s go then, no time like the present.” She smiled at her own joke but her dad was focused on the buttons and screen in front of him. She positioned herself on the designated pad, just a square of duct tape on the cement floor. 

The power engaged, like it always did, with an unhealthy sounding clang followed by a puff of acrid smelling steam, and she felt herself being pulled from time. 

This part was most familiar, it was the sensation of the time vortex around her- it felt like a home; like a benevolent god, and it was the feeling that her dreams mistook for the TARDIS. 

Not even the TARDIS herself had felt like this, it was always more clinical, more separated from the raw power and majesty that coursed through her now. She sensed, more than saw, when she passed by the repeated points into a new territory. 

It came on her at once, and suddenly she found herself not on a street like she normally did, but in the TARDIS herself. She looked different than Rose remembered, the interior panels and levers looked more alien, and more angry, with points and spikes and aggressive lines. 

The most astounding thing of all was the Doctor, standing in front of her, looking just how he did on the first day they met, only in clothes too small and a fear in his eyes she’d never seen.

“Who’re you?” He barked and she smiled. She’d missed him so much, missed this face with its sticky-out ears and the cross way he furrowed his eyebrows. 

“Who I am isn’t important.” She said. It was clear this was before they met, judging by the faint glow of golden energy around him, he’d only just regenerated. She couldn’t spoil him like this, not if it meant he might not find her that day in the shop. 

“Alright.” He said, accepting her at her word. “What do I do then? I don’t- I’m not sure why I’m still here, how I lived through that.” 

The fear was back and it was the shake in his voice that startled Rose more than anything. He needed her now and she wanted nothing more than to pull him into her arms and soothe him, even though he’d never let her. 

“You’re the Doctor, and it's important you’re alive. So many people are better off because you exist.” She glanced down at the device on her wrist, counting down to her return journey. She only had seconds. “Go to earth. Go to earth and just be you- save people, help and heal and yell when you have to because you’re important and people need you.”

There was a brief flicker of something like recognition in his eyes and he nodded. He still looked ridiculous in his too small clothes but now he had a purpose. He looked brave and beautiful and she loved him. 

The device chirped, giving her a two second notice and she smiled and lifted a hand. She thought she saw him smile back before the vortex took her and she was gone. 

The return journey was much like the first. The coursing power of the time vortex spun around her until she felt closer to home, noting the spots where she’d traveled so many times before, all those times and never once had she directly encountered the Doctor’s own timeline. It felt like one in a million, like winning a lottery she hadn’t known she’d entered. 

She hit the pad with a jolt and fell to her knees, hard on the cement floor. 

“Rose, hun, are you okay?” Her dad said, running from behind the monitors to grab her by both shoulders. 

She looked up and he could see she was smiling. 

“You did it then? That was the one?” He asked.

She shook her head. “Not yet, but that was important. I reckon I returned a favor. One of about a million I owe.” 

He looked at her with confusion and she shook him off. She’d tell him all of it eventually, in the ridiculous detail that their calculations required, but for now she just wanted to remember.


End file.
